Pakistanis negotiate for kidnapped students

By Alamgir Bitani

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani authorities negotiated on Tuesday for the release of about 200 students and staff from a military-run college abducted by Taliban militants as they traveled home for a holiday.

The abduction on Monday took place while the Pakistani army pressed on with an offensive against the Taliban in the Swat valley in another part of the northwest.

Militant violence has intensified in nuclear-armed Pakistan since mid-2007, with attacks on security forces and on government and Western targets.

The violence has alarmed the United States, which needs Pakistani action to help defeat al Qaeda and get to grips with the Taliban insurgency in neighboring Afghanistan.

Taliban fighters with hand grenades seized the students' convoy heading home for the summer holiday from the North Waziristan ethnic Pashtun region on the Afghan border to the town of Bannu, 240 km (150 miles) southwest of Islamabad.

Bannu police chief Iqbal Marwat said Taliban had seized up to 400 people in 28 vehicles but scores had escaped. The vice principal of the college, Javed Alam, later told Reuters about 200 had managed to slip away and had arrived at Bannu.

Mirza Mohammad Jihadi, an adviser to the prime minister on the tribal areas, said efforts were in progress to secure their release.

"Contacts have been established with the kidnappers and talks are under way," Jihadi told Reuters late on Monday.